Infinitive

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Infinitive

Infinitive is a grammatical term used to refer to certain verb forms that exist in many languages. As with many linguistic concepts, there is not a single definition applicable to all languages. The word is derived from Late Latin infinitivus, a derivative of infinitus meaning "infinite". Infinitives are used mostly as non-finite verbs.

In traditional descriptions of English, the infinitive is the basic dictionary form of a verb when used non-finitely, with or without the particle to. Thus to go is an infinitive, as is go in a sentence like "I must go there" (but not in "I go there", where it is a finite verb). The form without to is called the bare infinitive, and the form with to is called the full infinitive or to-infinitive.

In many other languages the infinitive is a single word, often with a characteristic inflective ending, such as morir ("(to) die") in Spanish, manger ("(to) eat") in French, portare ("(to) carry") inLatin, lieben ("(to) love") in German, etc. However some languages do not have any forms identifiable as infinitives. Many Native American languages and some languages in Africa andAustralia do not have direct equivalents to infinitives or verbal nouns; in their place they use finite verb forms in ordinary clauses or various special constructions.

As a verb, an infinitive may take objects and other complements and modifiers to form a verb phrase (called an infinitive phrase). Like other non-finite verb forms (such as participles,converbs, gerunds and gerundives) infinitives do not generally have an expressed subject; thus an infinitive verb phrase also constitutes a complete non-finite clause, called an infinitive (infinitival) clause. Such phrases or clauses may play a variety of roles within sentences, often as nouns (for example as the subject of a sentence or as a complement of another verb), and sometimes as adverbs or other types of modifier. Infinitives are not usually...